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The Birth of the Judson Dance Theatre: "A Concert of Dance" at Judson Church, July 6, 1962
Author(s): Sally Banes

Source: Dance Chronicle, Vol. 5, No. 2 (1982), pp. 167-212
Published by: Taylor & Francis, Ltd.
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The Birth of the Judson Dance Theatre:
"A Concert of Dance" at Judson Church,
July 6, 1962
Sally Banes
The Judson Dance Theatre was a loosely organized "collective"
for avant-gardechoreography in Greenwich Village in the early 1960s.
From 1962 to 1964, members of the group met weekly to present
choreography for criticism and they also cooperatively produced
twenty concerts of dance-sixteen group programsand four evenings
of choreography by individuals. The Judson Dance Theatre became
the focus of a new stage in American modern dance, the seedbed
out of which post-modern dance developed over the next two
decades.
The Judson Dance Theatre, which grew out of a choreography
class taught by Robert Dunn, drew on and consolidated various
currents of avant-gardechoreography in the 1950s-most notably
developing from Anna Halprin, James Waring,and Merce Cunning-
ham. It was a vital gathering place for artists in various fields who
exchanged ideas and methods, seeking explicitly to explore, propose,
and refute definitions of dance as an art form. The issues that con-
cerned the group ranged from training and technique to choreographic
process, music, performance style, and materials. There was no
single prevailing aesthetic in the group; rather, an effort was made
to preserve an ambiance of diversity and freedom. This attitude
gave rise to certain themes and styles: an attention to choreographic
? 1982 by Sally Banes
167

168 DANCE CHRONICLE
process and the use of methods that metaphoricallystood for

democracy;the use of languageas an integralpart of the dance;
the use of "natural,"or ordinary,movements;dancesabcoutdance.
The first concert produced by the Judson Dance Theatre, "A
Concertof Dance[# 1]," waspresentedon July 6, 1962, at Judson
MemorialChurch.
In the springof 1962, the membersof Robert Dunn's
choreographyclass,givenat the MerceCunninghamstudio, decided
to put on a public concert of works they had been showingto
each other in class. At the end of the previousyear'scoursethere
had been a showingof dancesfor friendsat Cunningham'sstudio
in the LivingTheatre building at Fourteenth Street and Sixth
Avenue. By the end of the secondyear of the coursethe classwas
largerand the studentsmore ambitious. "Therewas a body of work
whichit was called a shameto waste withoutat least a publicshow-
ing, and Judson was asked and they were agreeable. But it was
intendedas a one-shotconcert,"John HerbertMcDowellremembers.
"Wedecided to put on the concertjust for the adventureof it,"
StevePaxtonadds. "Goingout and doingsomethingelsewhere. The
LivingTheatrewas too small."
YvonneRainer,who had seen the first JudsonPoets'Theatre
productionin the choirloft of JudsonMemorialChurch,suggested
that the classlook into holdingthe concertthere. Paxtonmet with
Al Carmines,the ministerin chargeof the church'sartsprogram,and
set up a date for an audition. On the appointeddate Paxton, Rainer,
Ruth Emerson,and perhapsRobertand JudithDunnwent to the
church,wherePaxton, Rainer,and Emersondanced. Rainerdanced
Three Satie Spoons; Emerson,her Timepiece;and Paxton may
haveperformedTransit.* Paxton'smemoryof the auditionis that
"it was a pretty weak showing. But they said, 'Fine."'2 Emerson,
who thinksthat much of the impetusin planningthe concertcame
from Rainer,who wasreadyto show her accumulatedwork,recalls:
*The "perhaps" and "may have" suggest some of the problems in reconstructing
events nearly twenty years later. There will be a number of places in this
account wherepeople's memoriesdiffer on a particularpoint, and there is now
no way to arrive at "the truth."

JUDSONDANCETHEATRE 169
A CONC
OF DANCE
BILL DAVIS, JUDITH DUNN, ROBERTDUNN, RUTHEMERSON,SALLY GROSS, ALEX HAY,
DEBORAHHAY, FRED HERKO, DAVID GORDON,GRETCHEN MACLANE,JOHN HERBERTMCDOWELL,
STEVE PAXTON, RUDYPEREZ, YVONNERAINER, CHARLESROTMIL, CAROLSCOTHORN,
ELAINE SUMMERS,JENNIFER TIPTON
JUDSON MEMORIALCHURCH
55 WASHINGTONSQUARE SOUTH
FRIDAY, 6 JULY 1962, 8: 0 P.M.
The flyer designed by Steve Paxon for "A Concert of Dance," courtesy of
William Davis.

170 DANCECHRONICLE
Steve and Yvonne and I went down one very hot evening, and I think I
was asked just because I was around. I remember having the feeling
that Al wondered if we'd take all our clothes off or do something ter-
rible. We did a couple of pieces. We came prepared to be really serious
and to show him how we worked. I don't even know if he saw all our
pieces. After ten minutes he said, "Oh, this is wonderful, this is great.
No problem." And we all started laughing.3
JudsonMemorialChurch,an architecturallyeclectic building

at 55 WashingtonSquareSouth, at the cornerof ThompsonStreet,
was designedby StanfordWhitein 1892. Its stained-glasswindows
were designedby John LaFarge,and its baptistrywas built by
HerbertAdamsfromplansby AugustusSt. Gaudens.The church
itself was built by EdwardJudson in memory of his father,
AdoniramJudson,who went to Burmain 1811 as one of the first
Americanmissionaries. The church, dually affiliated with the
AmericanBaptistChurchand the United Churchof Christ,was a
basefor laborunion organizingin the 1930s and for the civil rights
movement, school integrationactivities, and drug addiction re-
habilitationprogramsin the 1960s. In 1961 the parishplayedan
activerole in overturninga ban on folk-singingin WashingtonSquare
park-after a year of protestsand sit-ins-and in the sameyear the
chief minister,HowardMoody, was elected head of the Village
IndependentDemocrats.4
After WorldWarII, when many of the church'smembers
movedout of the city, RobertSpike,ministerfrom 1948 to 1955,
startedan artsprogram,partlyout of personalinclinationand partly
to stimulatethe life of the church. Concertsand playsweregiven
and paintingsexhibited. ThenMoody,who came to the churchin
1956, organizedthe JudsonGallery,which showed works by Pop
artistsJim Dine, Tom Wesselman,Daniel Spoerri,Red Grooms,
and ClaesOldenburgas earlyas 1959. The "JudsonGroup"put on
a programof Happenings,Ray GunSpex, in early 1960; and later
that year Dine presentedhis Apple Shrine, an Environment. A
group called the Judson Studio PlayersperformedFaust in the
sanctuaryof the churchin 1959.5
In 1960, when Moody decided to start a residenttheatre
group the church,he hiredAl Carmines,who hadjust graduated
in

from Union TheologicalSeminary,to coordinatethe arts program

and organizethe JudsonPoets' Theatre. Whileat the seminary,
Carmineshad gone to partiesfor divinitystudentsat Judson;he also
remembershavingattendedan earlyAllanKaprowHappeningthere.
WhenCarminesheardthat therewas an openingfor someoneto run
the artsprogramat the church,he appliedfor the position. Whenhe
becameassociateminister-on a part-timebasis for the first two
years, while he earneda master'sdegree-Carminescontinuedthe
churchpolicy of aidingas manyartistsas possibleand supporting
the avant-garde without censorship.6
The first productionat the Judson Poets' Theatre, on
November18, 1961, was a doublebill of one-actplays: Apollinaire's
The Breasts of Tiresias and Joel Oppenheimer's The GreatAmerican
Desert. About two weekslater,on December3, Carminesorganized
a "Hallof Issues"at the JudsonGallery,to whichthe publicwas
invitedto contributeartworksand polemics. Duringthe 1961-62
season,JudsonPoets'Theatrepresentedthreemore programsof one-
act plays (openingin January,March,and May),and in MayPeter
Schumanngavea maskeddance/play,Totentanz,with the Alchemy
Players. In the summerof 1962 Carminesbeganwritingmusicbased
on popularformsfor the JudsonPoets' Theatre,startingwith George
Dennison'sVaudevilleSkit.7 Carmines'sapproachto makingtheatre
in the churchwas,he admitted,unconventionalfor a minister.
When I started the theatre in 1961 with the help of Robert Nichols,
who's an architect and playwright, we had two principles. One, not to
do religious drama. Two, no censoring after acceptance.... [The fact
that our plays are performed in] a church liberates me more than any
other place would. I've discovered for myself that God doesn't dis-
appear when you don't talk about him.
Like a lot of ministers, the real world was not part of my life.
Ministers are often preoccupied with themselves. The theatre broke
it all open for me. A source of revelation.8
Carminesremembersthat when the dancersapproachedhim

to ask whetherthey could put on a concertin the church,"I was
scaredof the kind of dancethey did. I wasused to ballet,maybe
MarthaGraham. I hadn't seen MerceCunningham.I said they'd

172 DANCECHRONICLE
have to give their first three concertsin the gymnasium,and the

board of the churchwould have to decide whetherit was proper
to do it in the sanctuary."9
The concert was plannedfor July 6, 1962. Accordingto
Rainer,"the selection of the programhad been hammeredout at
numerousgab sessions,with Bob Dunn as the cool-headedprow of
a sometimesoverheatedship. He was responsiblefor the organiza-
tion of the program."Paxtonremembersthat "it was largelyreasons
of necessity that determinedwhat had to follow what: who had
time to be wherewhen, who neededto be free at a certaintime so
they could change. Certainthingsweren'tpossible." He also recalls
that "Dunnmadethe orderof the dances,includingsome that were
shown with each other, which was a popularidea at that time:
'Let's havechocolateand strawberryat the sametime."'10
ElaineSummersrecalls:
Steve and Yvonne and Bob and Judy said, "Let's do a concert and
everybodycan pick one work of their own, or two, and it can be any-
thing you want. Makeyour own decision about what you're going to
present,and let's do a concert in July. It'll be hot, and there won't
be anyone there, and we'll just have a wonderfultime." And then we
all did whateverit was we had to do.
Everyonein the group was extremely responsible. Everybody
had their chores to do, and everybodydid them. And lo and behold,
we had this concert. And we had so much materialit startedat eight
and went until midnight. It was hot in there-ninety degrees-and we
were totally amazedbecauseso many people came. It was absolutely
crushed!l
Steve Paxton and Fred Herkoformed the publicity com-

mittee. Paxton designedthe flyer, which is plain, clear, and also
witty in its hint of repetitionandreversal.Herkowrote the press
release,dated June 22, whichexplainedthat the "youngprofessional
dancers"involvedin "A Concertof Dance"used a varietyof choreo-
graphictechniques. The participantswerenamed: Bill Davis,Judith
Dunn, Robert Dunn, Ruth Emerson,DeborahHay, Fred Herko,
RichardGoldberg,DavidGordon,GretchenMaclane[sic], John
HerbertMcDowell,StevePaxton,Rudy Perez,YvonneRainer,Carol
Scothorn, Elaine Summers,JenniferTipton. This release lists

choreographersand performerstogether as participants,without

settingup a hierarchy. "Indeterminacy,rulesspecifyingsituations,
improvisations,spontaneous determination,and various other
means"were named as choreographicstrategies,and a concluding
paragraphstated that the event would show a diversityof work,
and that the concert would "be of interest as it signalizes[sic] a
new concernon the partof the youngerdancersto exploredance
with the concernsand responsibilitiesof the choreographer as well
as those of the performer."An abbreviatedversionof this notice,
consistingof the firstparagraphand the namesof all the participants,
appearedin the VillageVoiceon June 28. The flyer was sent to
names on the churchmailinglist, as well as the dancers'friends
and acquaintances.12
The programfor the concert lists the followingcredits:
lightingdesign,CarolScothorn;lightingoperation,Alex Hay;musical
direction,RobertDunnandJohn HerbertMcDowell;costumecon-
sultant,Ruth Emerson;stagemanager,JudithDunn;film projector
operation,EugeneFreeman[sic]; advisory,Judith Dunn, Robert
Dunn.13
DespiteCarmines'originalplan, the concertwas givenin the
sanctuaryof the church,one flightup from the street-levelentrance
on WashingtonSquare. A curtainwashung from the edge of the
choirloft, at the oppositeend of the room from the altar,and served
as a dividerbetween the lobby-entranceand the performingspace
in the sanctuaryproper. It also servedas a backdropfor the "stage,"
which was simplythe spacein front of the curtain. An architectural
rhythmfor this settingwasprovidedby the four columnssupporting
the loft. The audiencewalkedin throughthe lobby, acrossthe bare
space,and to their seats. At that time the churchstill held tradi-
tional "highBaptist"services. Therewas a pulpit and a largecross
at the altar,at the south end of the sanctuary,and the congregation
sat in movablepews facingthe altar. The Poets'Theatreperformed
in the large choir loft, not on the sanctuaryfloor. The dancers
alteredthe arrangementof the sanctuaryby movingthe pews around
and puttingthem in front of the altar,facingnorth, and alongthe
sidesof the room, clearingthe rest of the spacefor the dancing.14

174 DANCECHRONICLE
"A Concertof Dance"was arrangedwith a slightly asym-

metricalbalanceof solo and group dances,solos by men and by
women, danceswith and without music, with live and recorded
music, talkingand singing,slow and fast and variabletempi,
simple and complex choreographicstructures,plain and fancy
costumes. The twenty-threeitems on the programwere divided
into fifteen units. Dance numberone was actuallya film, and it
was billedundera musicalterm: Overture.So from the moment
the concertstarted,the irreverenttrespassingof artisticboundaries
was present. A group work followed, then a solo by a woman,
then three solos by men, then anothergroupwork. In mirror
sequence,the next six dancesweregroup,male solo, threefemale
solos, anothergroup. The only duet was performedduringthe
intermission. Followingthe intermission,there were nine more
dances: group,two male solos, group,two femalesolos, male solo,
femalesolo, group. Two pieces of musicby ErikSatiewereheard
as accompanimentsin the firsthalf of the program(perhapsthe same
piece), but in betweenthem were two dancesin silencethat them-
selvessandwicheda danceto musicby Marc-AntoineCharpentier.
CartridgeMusic by John Cage,which was also used for two dif-
ferentdances,wasplayedonly once, as the dancesweredone either
simultaneouslyor overlappingone another.s1
Severalaspectsof this concertwouldlaterbecomeessential
featuresof the JudsonDanceTheatre,as this groupof choreographers
soon came to call itself: the democraticspiritof the enterprise;a
joyous defianceof rules, both choreographicand social;a refusal
to capitulateto the requirementsof "communication"and "mean-
ing" that were generallyregardedas the intention of even avant-
gardetheatre; a radicalquestioning,at times throughseriousanalysis
and at times throughsatire,of what constitutethe basicmaterials
and traditionsof dance.
As the audienceenteredthe sanctuaryat 8:15 on the evening
of July 6, a film was beingprojected. McDowellrecalls:
[The film] was Bob Dunn's doing and was beautiful. The dance con-
cert was announced to start at 8:30. The audience was admitted at
8:15, and they went upstairs into the sanctuary to find that in order

JUDSON DANCE THEATRE 175
to get to their seats they had to walk acrossa movie that was going on.
It was embarrassing,and Bob's whole point was to discombobulate
them, to quash their expectations. This movie consisted of some
chance-editedfootage by Elaine [Summers] and test footage that I
made, all of which was blue-y.... And W. C. Fields in TheBankDick.
And we went on exactly, preciselyfor fifteen minutes. The last
sequencein the film was the final chase scene from TheBankDick.
And then there was a marveloussegue between the unexpected film
and the dance. The first dance, which was by Ruth Emerson,started
on the dot of 8:30. As the movie wasjust about to go off, the six or
so people involvedcame out, the movie sort of dissolvedinto the dance,
and as the stage lights came up the dancerswere already on stage
and the dancehad alreadystarted.16
The authors of Overtureare listed as W. C. Fields, Eugene Freeman

[sic], John Herbert McDowell, Mark Sagers, and Elaine Summers.
Summers was then learning filmmaking from Gene Friedman, an
assistant camerman in commercial television and cinema who was
also a friend of McDowell's. Summers remembers being so stimu-
lated by the chance methods Dunn taught that she suggested making
a chance movie. Friedman had been giving Summers assignments
that, though they were traditional problems for beginning film-
makers, bear a striking similarity to some of Dunn's assignments
in the choreography class.
He would say, "Takea three-minutereel of film and do a complete

story nonverballywith it. And no cutting, you have to do it in the
camera." And then he would want one that had zooms.
So I had a lot of scrapmovies, and Gene was contributingnot
only his gurushipbut also films-tail ends of movies, called short
ends, from the TV stations where he was working. And John had
some W. C. Fields movies.
John, Gene, and I got together and used a chancesystem from the
telephone book. Wetook all the film stripsand we rolled them up
and we put them in a big paperbag. They had numberson them, like
one foot, two feet, three feet. We'dget a numberfrom the telephone
book, like 234-5654, and we'd have to put the film strips together
in that sequence.
I remembersaying, "Thiscertainlybringsout the stubbornin one,
becauseI don't want to put a two-foot strip here, I want to use a six-
foot one." And of course, that was one of the exciting thingsabout the
chancemethod. You suddenlyrealizethat you have a lot of opinions.17

A CONCERTOF DANCE
Judson Memorial Church
55 Washington Square South
Friday, 6 July, 8:30 P.M.
1. OVERTURE:W. C. Fields, Eugene Freeman, John Herbert

McDowell, Mark Sagers, Elaine Summers
2. Ruth Emerson: NARRATIVE

(performers: Judith Dunn, John Herbert McDowell, Steve
Paxton, Yvonne Rainer, Elaine Summers)
Ruth Emerson; TIMEPIECE
3. Fred Herkb: ONCEOR TWICEA WEEKI PUTON SNEAKERS TO
GOUPTOWN
(music: Erik Satie; pianist: Robert Dunn; costume:
Remy Charlip)
Steve Paxton: TRANSIT
John Herbert McDowell: FEBRUARY FUNAT BUCHAREST
(music: Marc-Antoine Charpentier)
k. Elaine Summers: INSTANTCHANCE
(performers: Ruth Emerson Deborah Hay, Fred Herko,
Gretchen MacLane, Steve Paxton, John
Herbert McDowell, Elaine Summers)
5. David Gordon: HELEN'SDANCE
(music: Erik Satie; pianist, Robert Dunn)
6. Deborah Hay: 5 THINGS
Gretchen MacLane: QUBIC
Deborah Hay: RAIN FUR
7. Yvonne Rainer: DANCEFOR 3 PEOPLEAND6 ABMS
(performers: William Davis, Judith Dunn, Yvonne Rainer)
8. INTERMISSION: (coffee will be served in the lounge)

Yvonne Rainer: DIVERTISSEMENT
(performers: William Davis, Yvonne Rainer)
The originalprogramfor "A Concertof Dance,"courtesyof

WilliamDavis.

9. Elaine Sumers; THE DAILY WAKE

(structure realized by the following performers;
Ruth Emerson, Sally Gross John Herbert McDowell,
Rudy Perez Carol Scothorn)
(music: Robert Dunn, John Herbert McDowell,
Elaine Summers, Arthur Williams)
10. David Gordon; MANNEQUIN DANCE
(music: James Waring; costume; Barbara Kastle)
Fred Herk9-Cecil Taylor; LIKE MOSTPEOPLE--for Soren

(costume: Remy Charlip)
11. Steve Paxton- PROXY
(performers; Steve Paxton, Yvonne Rainer, Jennifer
Tipton)
12. John Cage: MUSIC
CARTRIDGE
Carol Scothorn ISOLATIONS
Ruth Emerson. SHOULDER
13. William Davis: CRAYON

(music The Volumes, Dee Clark, The Shells)
14. Yvonne Rainer: ORDINARYDANCE
15. Alex Hay, Deborah Hay, Charles Rotmil: RAFLADAN
Lighting design: Carol Scothorn; operator: Alex Hay

Musical direction; Robert Dunn, John Herbert McDowell
Costume onsultant: Ruth Emerson
Stage manager; Judith Dunn
Film operator; Eugene Freeman
Publicity: Fred Herko, Steve Paxton
Advisory: Judith Dunn, Robert Dunn
(Thanks are due to the public spirit of Judson

Memorial Church for the use of their facilities
and for coffee; further thanks to the Merry-Go-
Rounders, to Thomas Skelton, and to Michael Malce,
for vital assistance.)

178 DANCECHRONICLE
Accordingto McDowell,some of the segmentswere upside-down

and backwards.18
Allen Hughes,the dance critic for the New York Times,
called Overture"a movingpicture 'assemblage"'and wrote in his
reviewof the concert:
The overture was, perhaps, the key to the success of the evening, for
through its random juxtaposition of unrelated subjects-children play-
ing, trucks parked under the West Side Highway, Mr. Fields, and so
on-the audience was quickly transported out of the everyday world
where events are supposed to be governed by logic, even if they are
not.19
Item numbertwo consistedof two dancesby Ruth Emerson.

JudithDunn,John HerbertMcDowell,StevePaxton,YvonneRainer,
and Elaine Summersdancedin Narrative,a three-sectiondance.
Eachdancerwas givena scorethat indicatedwalkingpatterns,focus,
and tempo, and also cues for action based on the other dancers'
actions. The instructionswere not dramaticor psychologically
descriptive;they referredto abstractmovementsand individual
focus ratherthan interaction. For instance,directionsto dancerB
(Paxton)includethe directive"Takegreatcareneverto focus on G
[Rainer] or to directyour movementat her." Threeof the dancers
walkedalong geometricalpaths duringpart one: Paxton along
diagonals,Dunn along a rectangle,and Summersalong a circle;
McDowellwalked backwardsat random,and Rainerwalkedside-
ways at random. The focus for each dancerwas quite specific,and
eachhad to cue his or her tempo to those of the other dancers. In
the secondsection Dunnsat with focus down, Paxtondid a move-
ment pattern(two quickdiagonalextensionsof the foot and arm,
and a turningarmgesturein plie, with focus up) seventimes, and
Rainerdid anothermovementpattern(fouette with arms,break
at elbow and relax), four times. (The scores for the other two
dancersin the second section have been lost.) Part three was an
orchestrationof patternedexits, chiefly along diagonallines.20
Narrativewas not taught to the dancersor written with
expressiveovertonesin psychologicalterms,but Emersonsays that
she was tryingto makeit a dramaticdance-

Dramaticin the sense that by placingpeople in the space and by

turningthem in different directions, I could show somethingabout
relationships. Therewas little that happened,except people changed
their [spatialand temporal] relationshipsto one another. It had very
little tension, which is what I obviouslywould have liked to achieve.
I didn't feel it was a brilliantsuccess. I think I did not know very
much about groups of people and was finding out more about my
body and how to construct material for me. That was more
productive.21
The firstlive danceon the program,then, wasa new twist

on an old modem-dancetheme. The title suggestsa literalmeaning,
of the sort that the older generationof modem dancersalways
offeredan audience. And moder-dance choreographers often used
diagonal lines to connote dramatictensions. But Emerson's
Narrativewas a dramawithout a narrative,withoutspecificor co-
herentsymbolicmeaning.
The next dance was Emerson'ssolo Timepiece. It was
anotherdancestructuredby chance,basedon a chartthat extended
the categoriesshe had workedwith in earlierdances. The charthad
columnsfor quality(percussiveor sustained);timing(on a scalefrom
one to six, rangingfrom very slow to very fast); time (units of
fifteen seconds,multipliedby factorsrangingfrom one to six);
movements(five possibilities: "redbag,untying;turn,jump,jump;
hands,head, plie; walkingforwardside backside side;heronleg to
floor");space time (ten, twenty, thirty, forty, fifty, or stillness);
space (five areasof the stage plus offstage);front (directionfor
the facingof the body, with four squaredirections,four diagonals,
and one wild choice, marked"?");andhigh,low, or mediumlevels
in space. The qualitieshavingto do with movementand timingwere
put together,alongthe graphof absolutetime, separatelyfromthe
qualitiesdealingwith space. Thuschangesin area,facing,andlevel
in spacemightoccur duringa singlemovementphrase. Timepiece
startedout with stillness. "To my utterhorror,"Emersonrecalls,
"I had to get over the fact that I could start a piece with forty
secondsof stillness. One of the reasonsI liked the piece was that I
learnedI could do that."22

180 DANCECHRONICLE
Timepiece,with its componentstightly governedby various

independenttemporalcontrols,punninglyrefersto a stopwatchor
clock, the legendaryaccoutermentof both John Cageand Robert
Dunn. It also seemsan appropriatestep, in termsof the increasingly
upset expectationsof the audience,in instructingthe spectator.
After the first dance,Narrative,made clear what this new work
would not be, the second dance presenteda paradigmaticchance
dance,an exampleof what much of the new workwould be.
Paxton remembersEmerson'sdancing in Timepiece as
"boundy"-"Very long-limbed. Not particularlyarticulate. A lot
of large shapes, big sweeps.... "We talked a lot about her per-
formance,becauseshe looked very glazed when she performed.
I remembertrying to encourageher to be less glazed. And I re-
memberJudith Dunn looking disapproving,perhapsbecausethat's
how she [Dunn] looked when she performed. But somehowthat
was appropriateto her."23 The question of the dancer'sper-
formingpresencewas one of the issues this groupwas trying to
understandand resolvein a way consonantwith their emerging
styles. "Wedidn'twant to emote,"Paxtonexplains. "Onthe other
hand, the glazed look was obviously becoming or alreadyhad
become such a cliche."24
Unit numberthree on the programcomprisedthree solos
by men, whichmay haveindicatedthat they wereperformedsimul-
taneously,or else that they wereperformedin close sequence,with-
out a break. Thesesolos wereHerko'sOnceor Twicea WeekI Put
on Sneakers to Go Uptown; Paxton's Transit; and McDowell's
February Fun at Bucharest.
Jill Johnston,writingin the VillageVoice,describedOnceor
Twicea Week... (whichhad musicby ErikSatieplayedby pianist
RobertDunn,and a costumedesignedby Remy Charlip): "Herko
did a barefootSuzie-Qin a tassel-veilhead-dress,movingaroundthe
big open performingarea... in a semi-circle,doingonly the bare-
foot Suzie-Qwith sometimesa lazy armsnakingup and collapsing
down." He performed"withno alternationof pace or accent."25
Allen Hughesdevotedone-fifthof his reviewof the concertin the
Timesto this dance.

Fred Herkocame out dressedin multicoloredbath or beach robe with

a veil of lightweightmetal chainscoveringhis head and face ... One's
attention was rivetedto his dance, which was no more than a kind of
unvariedshufflingmovementaroundthe floor to the accompaniment
of a piano piece by ErikSatie. (Satie, incidentally,would have loved
it.)
This was the Sneakersdance, but Mr.Herkowas barefoot all the
while.26
Remy Charlipremembersthat he made a cap based on an

Africandesignfor Herko,with stringsof beads endingin small
shellsthat hung down overhis face andhead, expresslyto emphasize,
in sound and movement,the swayingthat was the dance'smotif.
Charlipalso thinks that the title was a kind of ironic reverse
snobbishness:if the bohemiansand avant-gardists downtowndanced
proudly in bare feet, then to put on sneakerswas to dressup, a
humorousconcessionto "aboveFourteenthStreet."27 Like the Pop
artiststhen workingin GreenwichVillage,Herkowasusingmaterial
frompopularcultureas the subjectof his work,for what Johnston
calleda Suzie-Qmightalso havebeen describedas the Twist,just
then enjoyingan enormousvoguein New Yorkdanceclubs.
Herkowas friendlywith Andy Warhol,whomhe had met at
the San Remo Coffee Shop at Bleeckerand MacDougalstreetsin
the Village. WarholremembersHerko(who committedsuicidein
1964) as "a very intense, handsomeguy in his twenties . . . who
conceivedof everythingin termsof dance." Warholnotes:
He could do so many things well, but he couldn't supporthimself on

his dancingor any of his other talents. He was brilliantbut not
disciplined-the exact type of person I would become involved with
over and over and over againduringthe sixties.... Freddy eventually
just burnedhimself out with amphetamine;his talent was too much
for his temperament. At the end of '64 he choreographedhis own
death and dancedout a window on CorneliaStreet.28
Paxtonwasnot impressedby Herko'sworkin generalduring

the JudsonDanceTheatreworkshopsandperformance.

182 DANCECHRONICLE
It seemed very campy and self-conscious, which wasn't at all my

interest. As I rememberhe was a collagistwith an archperformance
manner. You would get ballet movement,none of it very high-energy.
Maybe a few jetes every now and then. As a dancerhis real forte
was some very, very elegantlines. But in termsof actualmovement,
transitionsfrom one well-defined place to another, he did it rather
nervously. Holdinga position was more what he did than movingfrom
place to place.29
Allen Hugheswas more enthusiasticabout Herko'sstyle, as both

dancerand choreographer.
His dances were architecturally organized. He didn't just go willy-

nilly from here to there. He always had a sense of theatrical structure.
Herko was a performer with charisma. He may not have been a great
choreographer; I'm only saying that he vitalized that movement, he
gave it a vividness that many of the others did not. Herko was the
brightest performing star of all. He was a happy exhibitionist, which
makes theatre. He wouldn't allow himself to go too far off into inner-
somethings, because he never wanted to lose his public.30
Al Carmines,who workedmore closely with Herkoin the Judson

Poets' Theatre,recallsthat Herko'swork "alwaysincludedhumor
and pathos and high-classcamp. He was an unusualactor, and
adudiencesadoredhim. He learnedto be totally accessibleto an
audience."31
Steve Paxton's Transit, following Once or Twice a Week ...,
was a solo that presenteda spectrumof movementstyles, from
classicaldance (ballet) to "markeddance"(technicalmovement
performedwithout the high energy usually expended in per-
formance)to pedestrianmovement. It also presenteda spectrumof
speeds, from runningto slow motion. Paxton would performa
classicalballet phrase,then repeatit in a markedversion,run at
differentspeeds, and stand in tense or relaxedpositions. "It was
just takingitems and playingtheirscales,"32he recollects. Transit
was an analysisby dissection of ballet movement, which is
recognizableon stageby one of its essentialcomponents: a taut,
chargedbody.

Transit,whichPaxtonthinksof as a collage,wasmadespe-
cificallyfor the concertat the Judson,not for RobertDunn'sclass.
It was eightminuteslong. Paxtonperformedthe dancebarefootin
blackfootless tightsandleotard. Therewas no soundaccompani-
ment. Paxtonrehearsedthe dancefor a month;most of the time
was spentperfectingthe balletphrase,whichwas "a pet phraseof
MargaretCraske's.That'swhy I wantedit." Paxtonhad learnedthe
phrasesecondhandfromCarolynBrown,who regularlytook ballet
class at Craske'sstudio in the MetropolitanOperaHouse, as did
severalothermembersof the Cunninghamcompany. Paxtonwent
to Craskeonly occasionally.33
John HerbertMcDowellwas among the performersand
choreographers in the Judsonconcert with the least formaldance
training. He was a composer,trainedat ColumbiaUniversity,who
had begun writingmusic for dancein the early 1950s. Among
others, he had workedwith RichardEnglund,JamesWaring,Paul
Taylor, and Aileen Passloff. McDowellhad met Robert Dunn in
1961, when he hired Dunn to play the piano for Taylor'sInsects
and Heroes. McDowellfirst took movementcoursesfor theatre
from Alec Rubin at the MasterInstituteand then joined Dunn's
choreographycourse.34
Jill Johnston wrote approvinglyof McDowell'sFebruary
Fun at Bucharest
John Herbert McDowell is a composer. He has no dance training....

Having no ties or tensions arising from a training and having an in-
ordinate sense of fun, McDowell distinguishes himself as a "natural"-
not a natural dancer (although you could think of it that way if you're
not too set in your idea of what dancing is): I mean a natural person
going about the business at hand, which in this case consisted of a few
zany actions performed in a red sock and a yellow sweater.35
Dianedi Primadescribedthe danceas "JohnMcDowellin a red sock,

leapingaboutlike a dementedpixie." McDowellhimselfremembers
that he stood on his headin front of a mirrorandpulledhis hair
out. But these "zanyactions"wereset againstthe baroqueweight
of music by Marc-AntoineCharpentier.McDowellsays that the
music had nothing to do with the dancing;he simplyhad to use

184 DANCE CHRONICLE
other people's music to accompany his own dances. Perhaps

McDowell's choice was also governed by an ironic tribute to a
special alliance between theatrical dance and religion that preceded
Judson Church and its Dance Theatre: Charpentierwas, after all,
one of the most important composers of Louis XIV's court-re-
nowned for its opera-ballets-where he composed both theatrical
and religious music.36
The dance listed as item number four on the program was
Elaine Summers' Instant Chance. Summers used high, numbered
Styrofoam blocks, carved into different shapes and painted dif-
ferent colors on different surfaces, to cue movement for the dancers
(Ruth Emerson, Deborah Hay, Fred Herko, Gretchen MacLane,
Steve Paxton, John Herbert McDowell, and Summers herself). The
dancers would throw the blocks up in the air. Each dancer had a
separate movement choice in response to the three different factors
that fell top up. The shape dictated the place or type of movement;
the color told the rate of speed; the number governed the rhythm.
For instance, Emerson's score indicates that for the cone, her move-
ment should be in the air; for the cube, in releve; for the column,
standing; for the sphere, sitting or kneeling; for the oblong, on the
floor. If she saw yellow, she should move very fast; blue, fast;
purple, medium; red, slowly; pink, very slowly. The instructions
for following the cues dictated by the numbers reads: "Repeat
movement, every movement 5 times but the number equals a
rhythm. 1=1 (an insistent pulse), 2=2/4, 3=3/4, 5=5/4." Each
performer was also assigned a color as an identifying mechanism;
Emerson, called Pink, wore a pink leotard.37
Summers says that she called the dance Instant Chance be-
cause she felt that most chance dances used hidden operations:
the moves were determined by chance beforehand, but then the
dance was set and the audience had no way of knowing what method
the choreographer had used. (For instance, Merce Cunningham
has used this technique.) In Instant Chance the overt display of the
chance method was central to the viewing of the dance. The dance
also incorporated improvisation, because Summers gave very broad
parameters for movement choices. Although the choreographer
set up rules for her dancers, how these rules would come to be

expresseddependedon both the rollingof the "dice"and the im-

mediate decisionsthose circumstancesand instructionsprompted
in the dancers. Summersexplains,"If 'red'and 'one' meantcover
spaceandleap, I didn'tknow how that personwas goingto leap,
or how they weregoingto coverspace." Withthis score, Summers
was also tryingto confrontthe glazedor else overlyexpressivefaces
that plaguedso much of modem dance,and to produceinsteada
look of engagementand intelligentconcentration.The dancealso
promoteda senseof spontaneityand childlikeplay, valuingfreedom
of choice and action.38
In his reviewof the concertin the Times,Hughesexplained
the apparentmechanismof the dance,but he could not explainhis
reactionto it
Six performers appeared to be playing on a beach. They had various

objects, including a ball, that they tossed around like dice, and the
objects were numbered. The numbers that came up on the objects
probably gave the dancers clues as to what they would do next. In
any event, there was movement of all kinds going on steadily, and
for some reason or other, it was interesting much of the time.39
Accordingto DavidGordon,whoseHIelen'sDance wasitem

numberfive on the concert,his piece was one of the weaponshe
used in an ongoingattempt to make Dunn'sclass uncomfortable.
The primary concern of the Dunns was to teach chance proce-

dures, and they rigidly persevered against any chance occurrence that
might alter the course of an evening's schedule. A flick of the long
yellow pad and "let's get on with what we have to do" generally put
an end to spontaneous discussion. The dogmatic approach of the class
often irritated me, and I sought ways to beat the system. Helen's
Dance was made to a piece by Satie as a class assignment. We were
given the options of using the music in various ways. None of these
options included the possibility of ignoring the music, which is what I
chose to do. The apartment that I lived in then was a three-room rail-
road flat, and I had no studio space available to me so I made a long
narrow piece that moved through the three rooms. I performed it in
about twelve feet of space at the Judson. Helen's Dance was a series
of twenty-odd activities performed in a straight line, one after another,
including some gestural dance material. Miming planting a flower was
one of the things.

t.
.I
S***.6

The costume, I rememberlater, had black-and-whitestripedtights

and a black-and-whitegeometricallypatternedtop trimmed with jet
fringe. At the JudsonperformanceI probablywore black tights and a
black tank top leotard.... The piece was namedfor a friend who died
of cancer at that time, and it became inexorably confused with her
death in my mind until I realizedthat I was performingit in a terribly
sentimentalfashion, and I neverdid it again.40
LikeHerko,like the choreographerSimoneForti, who had been an

early memberof the Dunn choreographyclass,like the composer
La MonteYoung,and perhapseven like Satiein a way that he never
intended,Gordonchose to amplifyconcentrationon a singlephe-
nomenon-anotherway to get closerto the "facts"of things,to list
thingsis an elementalform.
Numbersix on the programcontainedthree solos: Deborah
Hayin her 5 Things,GretchenMacLanein her Qubic,and Hay again,
this time in RainFur. All threedancesweredone in silence,and
it may be that they overlappedin some way, as Paxtonsuggested
about the arrangementof the programas a whole. (Neitherchore-
ographercan remember,however,whetherthis was the case or not.)
Hay,one of the youngestmembersof the group,had grown
up in Brooklyn,learningdancingfirst with her mother and then
at the Henry Street Playhouse. After a summerat Connecticut
College,whereshe becamefascinatedby MerceCunningham's work,
she enrolledin Dunn'schoreographyclass with her husband,the
painterAlex Hay. Hay destroyedher dancescoresin 1971, and she
remembersvery little about her early dancesat the Judson. She
thinks that in Rain Fur she reclinedon the floor in front of the
audience,with her backto them, "in a very familiar,painterlylying
posture." She then rolled over to the other side and faced the
audience. Perhapsthis is the dancethat Rainerrecallsfrom the first
concertin whichHay wore a skirtmadeof smallhoops that hobbled
her, severely restrictingher movement possibilities.41
Like Hay, Gretchen MacLane, who had grown up in Chicago
studyingballet, tap, and characterdancing,discoveredCunningham
David Gordin in Manequin Dance, photographed in 1966.

? 1966 by Peter Moore.

188 DANCECHRONICLE
duringa summerat ConnecticutCollege. She remembersseeing

Cunninghamand CarolynBrowndancingNight Wandering, and for
the first time being moved by modem dance. About her Qubic
(pronounced"cubic")she remembersonly that it was made for
Dunn'sclass,and that it must have been in responseto an assignment
about space, because she named it after the three-dimensional
tic-tac-toegamethen popular.42Paxtonremembersthat in Dunn's
class,MacLanewas "somebodywho had a gift for beingreallydroll
and constantlyfoughtit." MacLanerememberswatchingPaxton's
work and being "boredout of my mind." "But," she adds, "it
wasn'tbad beingboredin those days."43
The twelfth dancein the concert(item numbersevenon the
printedprogram)was Yvonne Rainer'sindeterminateDance for 3
Peopleand 6 Arms. It had first been performedon the March24
programat the MaidmanPlayhouseduringthe New York Poets'
Theatrefestival of 1962. Rainerdescribesthe dance as "a trio
consistingof an improvisedsequenceof predeterminedactivities."
It was first dancedby Rainer,WilliamDavis,and TrishaBrown;at
the Judson concert Judith Dunn replacedBrown, who was in
Californiafor the summer.44
The movementoptions, as mightbe expectedfrom the title,
emphasizedthe dominanceof the arms,althoughthe whole body
was set in motion. The armsoften led, workedindependentlyof,
or wereset againstthe rest of the body'smotion. In a sensethe
dancewas a probinganalysisof the functionof the balleticport de
bras. The choicesthat the dancerscould makeincludedten "move-
ments,"three "actions,"and two "positions." At the beginningof
the dance,the threeperformersstood upstagefor a moment,then
all threedid the third "movement":a turned-inattitude with spread-
eaglearmsthat pulledthe body around,the whole action traveling
downstage. For the next fifteen minutes,the performersfreely
madetheirown choicesfrom the gamutsuppliedby Rainer,except
for one restriction: when anyone startedone of the "actions"-
Yvonne Rainer in Ordinary Dance as performed in February

1963 at Judson Hall. Photograph by V. Sladon.

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190 DANCE CHRONICLE
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the one that Rainerdescribesas "'Blam-blam.Blam. Blam-blam,'

accompaniedby flat-footedjumpingabout"-the other two had to
stop what they were doingandjoin in. Rainer'sexaminationof arm
movementsincludeda balleticport de bras,nicknamed"Flapper,"
done with limp arms,while the dancertraveledforwardin a relaxed
alternatingfourth position. In another "movement"the body
engagedin "foot-playwith one hand 'consciously'movingthe other
hand about the body. Handsalternatebeing 'animate'and 'in-
animate."' Another"movement"was a seriesof activitiesincluding
a releve with the right palm glidingup the nose, scratchingthe
arm while walkingin a circle, then throwingthe head back while
bendingthe knees in parallelplie. The arms"swim"or droop,
the handsplacethemselveson the body while the dancerwalksin
plie and squeaks,or the hands clasp the anklesduringbourree
steps, or the hand and head vibratewhile the rest of the body
collapsesinto a squat. The other two "actions,"besidesthe flat-
footed "blam-blam,"were movingthe armsas quickly as possible
and simultaneouslydescendinginto the prone position as slowly
as possible,and rockingfrom side to side while the handsplay a sort
of gamewith the head-trying to claspeach other without the head
noticing. The two "positions"were "ghoul"and "twistwith eye-
ballsup-perched on one leg. Placedeither d.[own] s.[tage] right
or d.s. left."45
After seeingthe firstperformanceof Dancefor 3 Peopleand
6 Arms, at the Maidman,Jill Johnstoncalled it "dazzling"and
announcedthat Rainerhad "arrived"as a choreographer.Maxine
Munt, writingin Show Businessabout the same concert, thought
the dance"redundantand disaffectinglygauche."46
WilliamDavis,who was a memberof MerceCunningham's
company at the time, remembers Dance for 3 People and 6 Arms
as one of his happiestperformingmoments.
I rememberwaitingfor the curtainto go up at the MaidmanTheatre.

I think it was the first time dancerswere waitingfor a curtainto go
up without havingany idea whatsoeverof the shapethe dancewas
going to take.
That kind of thing was being done musically [in the work of Cage
and his colleagues]. But what this reallyresembledwasjazz musician-
ship, more than chance operations,in the sense that we knew the
"themes," but not the "orchestration." We would all be working

192 DANCECHRONICLE
for a time when we might, for example, do this, or, seeing what some-
one else was doing, think, "Oh yes, I can connect this to that," or
"They'redoing fine, I'll just let them go at it." It was a sense of shape
takingplace in three people's minds as the dance was going on. It was
wonderfulto perform.47
The demandsof the movementsthemselvesso taxed the

dancers'coordinationthat to be as awareof each other'sactionsas
Davisdescribesrequireda finely tuned sensitivityto the other per-
formers. LogicallyextendingJohnCage'suse of indeterminatemusic
scores-somethingCunninghamhimselfhad not attempted-Rainer
createda dancethat both gavecontrolgenerouslyto the performers
and demanded their utmost concentration, attention, and
intelligence.
Intermission,numberedeight on the program,followed
Dance for 3 People and 6 Arms. The program noted that coffee
would be servedin the lobby. But Raineralso presentedDivertisse-
ment, in the traditionof balletentr'actesin Europeanoperas. Spoof-
ing dancepartnering,Rainerand Davisenteredthe sanctuaryfrom
behindthe curtain,graspingone anotherclumsily. Theirlegs inter-
locked so that they could barelywalk,and then only sideways. They
stumbledacrossthe floor, lurchingthroughthreeor four different
steps, then exited throughthe lobby.48
In a way, Divertissementwas a comment on Rainer'sown
workand the workof her colleaguesas well as a satireon traditional
theatricaldance. ComingdirectlyafterDancefor 3 Peopleand 6
Arms, probablythe most radicaldance on the programin terms
of its structureand movements,Divertissementacknowledgedthat
Dance for 3 People and 6 Arms and the other unconventional dances
on the programwere not devoid of roots in a historicaldance
tradition.
Afterintermissioncame Summers'TheDaily Wake,number
nine on the programand the fourteenthdance. Thiswas a group
piece basedon readingnewspapersas scores. The creditssay that
the "structure[was] realizedby the followingperformers: Ruth
Emerson,Sally Gross,John HerbertMcDowell,Rudy Perez, Carol
Scothom." The musicwas by RobertDunn,John HerbertMcDowell,
Elaine Summers,and ArthurWilliams,a downtown playwright.

Summers herself made up a movement sequence inspired by the

scores, then gave the dancers written instructions specifying move-
ment qualities for the three sections of the dance. She also per-
sonally taught them a series of poses taken from photographs in the
newspaper. The dance began in stillness. Then all five dancers
performed individual dances at individual tempos during the first
section of the piece. When they had finished, each assumed the first
pose assigned him or her for section two, until all five had assumed
poses, and the series, including group poses, began. The positions
included the Twist, swimming, an umpire, soldiers, a handshake,
Rockefeller, a bride, graduation, and a Pantino advertisement. In
the third section, each dancer was assigned certain numbered move-
ment phrases, certain actions and qualities to apply to these phrases,
a floor pattern that corresponded graphically to a newspaper layout
design, and a time pattern.49
Summers explains her use of the newspaper as a method for
generating a score:
The Daily Wake was based on the front page of a daily newspaper, the
Daily News. What they have reported is already dead and finished,
so it has a wakelike quality. I took the front page and laid it out on
the floor and used the words in it to structure the dance, and used the
photographs in it so that they progressed on the surface of the page
as if it were a map. If you start analyzing that way, vou get deeper
and deeper. You get more clues for structure, like how many para-
graphs are there? Beginning with The Daily Wake, I became very
interested in using photos as resource material, and other structures
as maps.50
The interest in photographic freeze-framesof movement, which also

informed Paxton's Proxy, signals an analytic concern with the
moment-to-moment process of human movement, almost as if the
choreographers wished to appropriate the filmmaker's ability to
slow down a film and watch it frame by frame. It is also a strategy
for making movement without submitting to personal taste.
Item number ten on the evening's format consisted of David
Gordon's Mannequin Dance and Fred Herko's collaboration with
Cecil Taylor Like Most People-for Soren. According to Gordon,

194 DANCE CHRONICLE
MannequinDance was made, in responseto anotherclass assignment,

while standingin a bathtubwaitingfor A-200 to take effect on a bad
case of crabs. In the piece, I turnvery slowly from facing stageright
to diagonallyupstageleft and slowly make my way down to lie on the
floor. That about covers the territorythat a bathtub has to offer.
The piece took about nine minutes to perform, duringwhich I sang
"SecondHandRose" (after Fanny Brice and before BarbraStreisand)
and "Get MarriedShirley,"two songs to which I had become addicted.
It was slow, tedious, concentrated,theatrical,virtuosic, and long.51
After he had begunloweringhimself to the floor, Gordonraised

his hands graduallyuntil they extended out in front of him and
wiggledhis fingersslowly and regularly.The effect was both sooth-
ing andmacabre. Besidesthe singing,musicwas providedby James
Waring,who passedout balloonsto the audienceand askedthem to
blow up the balloonsand to let the air out slowly.52
The reasonthe piece was calledMannequinDance . . . was that I had

had the idea to rent department-storemannequinsand place them
dressedor nude at variouspoints in the performingareaand to perform
the piece ten times in one eveningwith two- or three-minuteintermis-
sions between performances. Duringthe intermissions,the mannequins
would be moved to differentpositions, or have their costumes changed.
I neverperformedit more than once in an evening,and I neverrented
the mannequins,but the name stuck.53
Diane di Prima,who was fascinatedby Gordon'ssingingduring

MannequinDance,noted the touchingqualitiesof his performance:
"DavidGordonstandsstill a lot. The flow of energy,like a good
crystal set. The receivingand giving out one operation,no
dichotomy there. One incredibledance, Mannequin, where he
moved slowly from one off balanceplie to one other, singingall
the while, [was] somehow terribly moving." Jill Johnston
describedsome of the movementsin Gordon'stwo dancesmore
specifically: "The body bent off center, the head awkwardly
strainedback, the elbows squeezedinto the ribs as the flattened
handsand forearmsmadethe painfulbeauty of spastichelplessness.
As thoughthe body were straining,yelling,againstan involuntary
violence." 54

Rainerand Gordonwerenot the firstmodem choreographers

to use awkwardmovements. The modem dancersof the 1930s
were criticizedfor using distortionand dissonancein their chore-
ography, and they respondedby arguingthat these were the
qualitiesnecessaryto representmodem times.55 The awkward-
ness of Rainerand Gordon,however,wasnot symbolicallyexpres-
sive. It did not mean pain, as the Grahamcontractionsdid in
Lamentation,for example. In the matter-of-factattitude toward
life and art of the dance of the early 1960s (with movementone
componentof both), awkwardnesswas one partof a gamutof move-
ment and body possibilities-and,perhapsbecauseless familiarin
art but more familiarin life, a moreintriguingone to young choreg-
rapherswho had neverseen firsthandthe stridentmodem danceof
the 1930s, but only its mutated,classicizeddescendants(like the
dancesof Cunninghamand Taylor)and its more dilutedor softened
forms (late Grahamandher followers).
The only extant descriptionof FredHerkoand CecilTaylor's
Like Most People is di Prima'sreview in The Floating Bear, in which
she was frankabouther friend'sshortcomings.
Fred Herko'swork still less clearly defined than those two [Gordonand
Rainer]. Seemsto come from more variedplaces. His danceshappen
inside his costumesa lot ... Like Most People he performedinside
one of those Mexicanhammocks (brightly colored stripes) and Cecil
Taylorplayed the piano. It was some of Cecil'svery exciting playing,
and after a while the dance startedto work with it, and the whole thing
turnedinto somethingmarvelousand unexpected.56
Paxton remembersthat Taylor fell asleepbackstage,and Herko

woke him up just beforethe dancebegan. Taylor"stumbledright
out and startedto play." Thejazz pianistTaylorand Herkoprob-
ably met throughLeRoi Jones and di Prima,co-editorsof The
FloatingBear, a literarynewsletterthat primarilypublishednew
poetry, but also carriedreviews of music (especiallyjazz), art,
theatre,and dance. Herko,a friendandneighborof di Prima'ssince
the mid-l 950s, occasionallywrote for TheFloatingBearandhelped
with its production,as did JamesWaringand Cecil Taylor;Soren
Agenoux (whose pseudonymwas taken from Kierkegaardand the

196 DANCECHRONICLE
Frenchphrasemeaning"on one's knees")was anothermemberof

The Floating Bear circle.57
Steve Paxton had madeProxy, item numbereleven, while
on tour with the Cunninghamcompanyin 1961. A trio, danced
by Paxton,YvonneRainer,and JenniferTipton,Proxy wasa "slow-
paceddancein four sections,with two photo movementscoresfor
[sections] two and three:instructionsfor [sections] one and four."
The danceinvolveda greatdeal of walking,standingin a basinfull
of ball bearings,gettinginto poses taken fromphotographs,drink-
ing a glassof water,and eatinga pear. Paxtonspeaksof the dance
as a responseto the workin Dunn'sclasswith John Cage'sscores.
He wantedto go beyond arrangingmovementby chanceProcedures
and actuallymade the movementusing aleatorytechniques. "If
you had the chance process,"Paxton wondered,"why couldn't
it be chance all the way?" Paxton wanted to removethe chore-
ographicprocessalso from the cult of personalimitationthat sur-
roundedmodem dance,a cult that beganwith a directtransmission
of movementsfrom teacherto pupil andended with a hierarchically
structureddance company.58 In Proxy, that learningprocesswas
mediatedby the use of a photo score, which had been made by
gluingcut-outphotographsof people walkingand engagedin sports,
and cartoonimages(Muttand Jeff, plus one froma traveladvertise-
ment) on a largepiece of brownpaper. A movablered dot marked
the beginning,which could be chosen at randomby each dancer.
The score was largeenough that the dancerscould look at it on
the wall while they were dancing. After choosingtheir beginning
point on the score,the dancerscould also choose whetherto take a
linearor a circularpath throughthe images. The rulesset down by
Paxtondictatedthat they must go all the way throughthe scoreand
performas manyrepeatsas wereindicatedon it. But timingand
transitionsbetween the postureswere left up to the dancers. In
rehearsingthe dance,Paxtonprimarilyworkedon gettingthe details
of the posturestranslatedaccurately.59
The first section consistedof eatingand drinking.A small
square had been markedoff with yellow tape on the floor;one per-
formercameinto the square,sat down, and ate a pear. The next
personcameout, stood in the square,and dranka glassof water.

IL~~ ~ ~ ~ ~
Steve Paxton'sProxy in a 1966 performancewith LucindaChilds,Robert

Brown. ?) 1966 by PeterMoore.

198 DANCE CHRONICLE
The dancers then walked around the backdrop seven times in large
circles. On one of the circuits, the basin with ball bearings was
deposited on the floor, and one of the dancers stood in it while
another led her around in a circle. In the next two sections, the
picture scores were performed, and in the final section, the per-
formers walked again and picked up the basin.60
The walking, which by the late 1960s would become a hall-
mark of Paxton's choreography, was intended to create a placid,
authoritative, reduced pace. "I tried not to tamper with it too much,
so that it wasn't too special and it just occurred.... Just someone
walking," Paxton explains. The title was a deliberate play on words,
also a hallmark of Paxton's later dances. "The word as a proxy for
the dance, the title being the encapsulation of the thing, and the fact
that the dancers made decisions about what the movement was.
Also, a proxy marriageis one in which a picture is used instead of
the person's actually being there."61 The implication is that the
participant can also be the detached observer who-through a Zen-
like emotional neutrality, repetition of simple actions, and concen-
tration on ordinary things-can examine and confront personal
attachment.
One of the assignments Robert Dunn had given his class
was to take something, cut it up, and reassemble it. Both Carol
Scothorn and Ruth Emerson had done their dances for this assign-
ment to Cage's CartridgeMusic. These cut-ups, Isolations and
Shoulder r, together with CartridgeMusic, are listed on the program
as item number twelve. Scothorn, who taught dance at the Univ-
ersity of Californiaat Los Angeles, was in New York for a year to
study Labanotation; for Isolations she chose to cut up Labanotation
scores. While making the dance, according to Emerson, Scothorn
"had a horrible time. The first thing she had to do was shorten her
neck. She almost gave up the whole project, but she's a very stub-
born person and she worked it out."62
Scothorn remembersIsolations as an attempt to "'push back
the barriers,' that is, to expand the body possibilities beyond the
reflex vocabulary." She recalls the assignment not as a cut-up but
as based on John Cage's Fontana Mix score. One or two trans-
parencies were placed on a page of Labanotation score (rather than

music paper). The transparencyhad crisscrossinglines on it, and

Scothor assignedeachline a movementvaluebasedon Labanota-
tion concepts. The ends of the lines representedextremesof the
movementvaluesand the middles,neutralor mediumaspectsof the
values. For instance,one line rangedfrom the symbolfor extension
to the symbolfor contraction,anotherfromhigh spatiallevel to low
spatiallevel, a third from clockwiserotation to counterclockwise
rotation. As the lines crossedthe Labanotationstaff, whichmoves
up the pageverticallyandrepresentsbody partswith its columns,
the movementvalue of the line had to be expressedby the body
part intersectingwith that line. Thus the first movementof the
dancerequiredthat the headmove to "placemiddle." Accordingto
Scothorn:
This means the head must telescope into the neck like a turtle's, a very
challenging task! Actually, it was very satisfying in a mind over matter
sort of way. It required total physical concentration to perform the
movement sequences in which different parts performed the same
movement in rapid succession in a non-logical order.
For instance,the line for clockwiserotation passedthrougheach

column,so that the resultingphrasewas a seriesof rotationsthat
passedfromhead to righthand,rightarm,chest, rightleg gesture,
rightsupport,left support,left leg gesture,torso, left arm,left hand.
There were no horizontal lines on the Fontana Mix score, so no move-

ment "chords" were produced. Everything passed rapidly from one
part of the body to the other. There were long periods of silence (when
no line was crossing the staff). The score was assigned a time value
of 1 second to the square.
I remember Merce's reaction, which was one of interest except that
it didn't travel in space. For that to happen, one of the lines would
have had to provide for some other kind of spatial values.63
AlthoughEmersondoesn'trememberwhat kind of material

she herselfcut up, her scoreindicatesthat she also used elements
from Labanotation.Herscorefor Shoulderr lists severalcategories
of elements: space-coveringmovements(walk, run, triplet, crawl,
skip, hop); space(five differentareasof the performancespaceplus

200 DANCECHRONICLE
off-stage); geometric patterns (yin-yang circle, circle, vertical

rectangle,horizontalrectangle,triangle,wavyline). Therearealso
elementsof timingand of absolutetime. A secondset of categories
dealt with body parts(rightleg, arm,hand,ribs,head, foot, andleft
leg, arm, hand, shoulder,hips, and spine) and movementqualities
(percussive,swinging,violent, sustained,rotary,heavy). Further
instructionsincludedlow and high levels, stillness,in the air, sit
down;contact floor, focus right,forward,left, down, up, back,still-
ness, front facing,and smile. Five sets of elementswerereshuffled
and set in one order;the secondgroupwas also recombinedand laid
next to the first seriesalong the same time-grid,sometimesover-
lapping. For example,duringthe first five secondsof Shoulderr,
the elementswere "triplet4 very slow wavyline low" and "ribsspine
slow rotaryfloor." For the next fifteen seconds,the firstpartof
the chart reads "hop 4-triangle high," while for the first five of
those secondsit also reads"ribships-rotary floor"and for the next
ten secondsreads"headspinevery fast rotarysmile."64
Although Emersondoes not rememberwhat the dance
looked like, in trying to reconstructit from the score I felt that
Emerson'sresponseto the cut-up assignmentmust have been as
demandingto performas Scothorn'shad been. She had to keep
trackof both locomotion and the changingmovementof separate
body parts. Despitethe fact that the scoresometimescalls for very
slow movement,the dance(as I interpretit) has a qualityof wild
abandon,as if the body weregoingoff in countlessdirectionsall at
once. Thereis an energeticawkwardness,derivingfrom the justa-
position of actions and quickly shiftinglevels that was presentin
the earlyworkof PaulTaylorand MerceCunningham.Emerson's
title was also a joke, because "shoulderr" was one element that
neverenteredinto the chartat all.
WilliamDavis'sCrayonwas item numberthirteenon the
program. Davis,who had been dancingsince he was a child in
southernCalifornia,had moved to New York in 1959 and joined
MerceCunningham's companyin 1961. AlthoughDavishad never
taken Dunn'schoreographyclass,he wasclose to many of Dunn's
students;he took dance classeswith them both at the Cunning-
ham studio and at the JoffreyBallet School, and he dancedin

Cunningham'scompanywith Steve Paxton and Judith Dunn. He

dancedwith Rainerin Waring'swork. He also dancedin Rainer's
Dance for 3 People and 6 Arms in the Judson program. So he was
invitedto contributea dance.
Crayonwas a solo accompaniedby threerock-and-rollsongs:
"I Love You," by the Volumes;"Iey Little Girl,"by Dee Clark;
and "Baby,Oh Baby,"by the Shells. In the traditionof Merce
Cunninghamand John Cage,the dancingwasnot done to the music,
but co-existedwith it in time and space,an effect that wasjarring
when the music had the four-square,propulsivebeat of rock-and-
roll. The dancebeganin silence,and afterabout twenty secondsthe
threesongsfollowedin sequence. Davisrecalls:
I was hoping to set up an exhilaratingsurprise,and I felt if I didn't
establisha kinetic line first, it might not be possibleto keep any separa-
tion. The movementwas to ride along on top of the sound like riding
a wave, and I wanteda paddlinghead start, to get aheadof the crest
and avoid being swampedin the rhythmor the sentimentof the music.
The first recordwas the Volumes' "I Love You," which takes off
with insistent rhythmand a loud rush of harmonicsweetnessof sound
and lyrics. This was pre-Beatles,and pop music was still just for its
own audience. I went straightfor sentimentalforce.
Therewereno populardancestepsin Crayonto correspondwith the

popularmusic,nor weretherecharacterizations or movementjokes.
"It wasn't overtly funny, though I rememberthat people reacted
with laughter,"Davissays. "I supposethe movementmust have
seemedCunninghamesque, with overtonesof ballet."
Of the actual movements,amongthe few things I can rememberare a
large, vertical-circlingone-arm port de bras, rather like the "lyre
strumming"in Balanchine'sApollo; a horizontalcirclingof one hand
aroundthe head (as though wipinga gianthalo) while the other hand
shimmeredpalm down out to the side at the end of a straight,extended
arm;and some skittering,rabbit-hopping,two-step jumps in releve
plie on a downstagediagonal. There were severaluses of a pointing
fingerin the dance, to indicate a directionof energy,or just as little
emblems-like Paul Klee arrows.65
WalterSorrell,reviewingCrayonat a laterconcert,suggests
that the dance is emblematicof a hip, angryyoung generationof

William Davis in Crayon as performed in February 1963 at Judson Hall. P

rebels.65 Perhaps,despite Davis'srepudiationof characterization

in the solo, the dancedid exude the senseof joyous defiancethat
popularsongsin the early 1960s extolled. Paxtonremembersbeing
thrilledby Crayon'sfreshness
It seemedlike a logical thing to do in a way; it was a collagistmentality.

But no one was collaging what was really current. Everybody [in
dance] seemed to be into esotericaor surrealqualitiesin their work.
Bill seemed to be pretty up-frontabout includingthe whole realmof
pop music in the dance scene, suggestinga kind of earthinessand
raunchinessthat was totally lacking otherwise. Everybodyelse was
either in an intellectual sphere or involved in artistic choice-making
that included fairly decadent, decorativeart. Crayonwas very re-
freshingin this slightly rarefiedatmosphere.67
FollowingCrayon,Rainerperformeditem numberfourteen,
her solo OrdinaryDance. Choreographed duringthe time of Dunn's
class,OrdinaryDance was not a solutionto an assignment;nor did
it springfrom a scoreor from chanceprocedures."By then I was
simply stringingmovementtogether,"Rainersays. "Unrelated,
unthematicphrases,with some repetition." While she danced,
Rainerspoke,recitinga poetic autobiographythat listed her family's
and her own addresses in San Francisco, Berkeley, and Chicago, up
to her first New York address;her gradeschool teachers'names;
and atmosphericsounds. The dance beganas Rainerenteredand
squatted. She immediatelybeganspeaking. From the squat she
did an elbow stand, fell over, and got up. She stampedher foot
heavilyeach time she said "Whack."For the most part,however,
the words,whichwerewrittenafterthe movementwas made,did
not correspondto the rhythmsor the connotationsof the move-
ment. At one point Rainerimitated the facial expressionof an
eccentric woman-"my loony-bin subway impersonation." Two
extant photographsshow frozen moments of other movements.
In one, Rainer went on releve with her right knee up to the side and
her armsoutstretched,holding the pose momentarily;then she
broughther leg and arm in sharply,dippingher torso over and
standingup straightagain,very quickly. In the other, her torso

204 DANCECHRONICLE
curvedto the left andher head washeld upright,while she walked

forward,saying,"Yesyes yes yes yes."
Rainerbeganmakingthe dance from imageryin Grimm's
fairytales. One of the movements(the womanhallucinatingon the
subway)was taken froma chancelectureshe had givenin Dunn's
class. Othermovementsarerecognizableas hallmarksof her style,
which savoredincongruitiesand awkwardness:the squattingand
falling,the bent torso with the head craningupright. Rainerwas
involvedat this point not only in wrenchingthe body into unex-
pected, clumsyconfigurations,but also in heighteningthe difficulty
of the dancer'saction by engagingthe memoryin simultaneously
recallingthe text and the complicatedmovementphrases. Though
the dance was a seriesof fragments,for the viewerits shattered
textureaddedup to an expressionof alienation. It was a dramatic
dance,but its powerderivedfrom the meaningsthat flowed from
the rubbingtogether of disparateelements, ratherthan from
explicit content. Di Primapredictedthat OrdinaryDance would
becomea classic. "Namingstreetsout of her past, movingin her
inimitablemanner,pausingand twitching,lyric and wooden, a sys-
tem of Dante'shell in dance,personalas any hell, but terrifyingly
clearto the observer."68
The first Judsonconcertendedaroundmidnightwith a col-
laborationamongAlex Hay, DeborahHay, and CharlesRotmil
called Rafladan. Rotmil played a Japaneseflute, DeborahHay
danced,and Alex Hay moved a flashlightaround. "I don't think
we consultedeach other,"Alex recalls,"wejust did it." His part
of the collaborationwas to makea frame-invokinghis profession
as a painter-andto standbehindit, so that his own activitycould
be seen metaphoricallyas a painting. "I stood in backof the square
in the darkand just did things with little pinlights,flew them
around." Paxtonrecallsthat in Rafladan,"Alexand CharlesRotmil
werebackgroundand Deborahdancedsporadically,in a very strong
performance.One of the movementsshe did was to pull her arms
up and drumher ribs with her fingers. At the end, when the lights
faded, Alex and Charleswrote thingsin the air with flashlights,
leavingafterimages."69

The concert had begunin darknesswith a film projection

fading into a lighteddance. It ended by fadingbackinto darkness
while the dancingcontinued. Fromstartto finish,the questionof
what constitutesa dancehad been raised. In Rafladanthe dancing
sometimeshappenedin the dark,suggestingthat the movementsof
a personnot directlyvisiblemightstill fall withinthe realmof dance.
One could see Alex Hay'smovementsindirectlyby watchingthe
lights as he manipulatedthem. But DeborahHay'smovements
werepresentto the spectatorsonly by implication.
All the criticswho attendedthe concertrealizedimmediately
that it was a signalevent in the history of modem dance. Allen
Hughes,who beganhis reviewof the concertby pointingout that
"therewashardlyanythingconventionalabout it," concludedthat
"the samegroupmay appeartogetheron anotheroccasion,andhave
a total flop. The chancesare,however,that theirexperimentswill
influence dance developmentin this country somehow, and be-
causethis seemslikely, they are worthwatching."Hughes,who had
seen earlierconcertsby Rainerand Herko,had only recentlyre-
placedJohnMartin,the first dancecriticof the New YorkTimes,
who had been a championof classicmodem danceduringhis tenure
at the Timesfrom 1927 to 1962. Accordingto Hughes,Martinalso
went to see the new avant-gardedance but seldom wrote about any
performancesthat happenedbelow Fourteenth Street. Hughes
explains, "WhenI becamedance critic, the paperaskedme to
broadenthe coverage. I had seen bits of experimentaldance,and as
far as I was concernedit was going to happen,and thereforemy
placewas to be there." Trainedprimarilyas a musiccritic,Hughes
wasnot consideredknowledgeableas a dancecriticby manymem-
bersof the dancecommunity. After Hughesreviewedthe Judson
concert,he noticed that his colleaguesdisapproved:
The dance establishment wasn't very big then; it was Dance Magazine,
Dance News, the Times and the Trib. And that was it. Jill Johnston
did all sorts of things downtown, but she was not part of it. After I
wrote this piece, when I saw my colleagues they turned up their noses.
The implication was that since I was new, I didn't know anything.70

206 DANCE CHRONICLE
After concluding that Gordon, Rainer, and Herko stood out

as new choreographers, "of definite promise," di Prima wrote:
At this distance,the eveningretainsits excitement, the high one feels

beingin on a beginning: these people workingout of a tradition(all
three are, or have been, membersof JamesWaring'sDance Company,
all three have studied with MerceCunninghamand have been highly
influencedby both of these masters)yet in each case doing something
that was distinctly theirs,unborrowed,defined. Yvonne Rainerto a
large extent summingup existing techniques, Fred Herko and David
Gordonin their unsimilarways marchinguncautiouslyforwardinto
what may be new romanticisms. Interesting,too, that for all the dance
is once more pushingat its so-calledboundaries: David'stalkingand
singing in Mannequin, Yvonne's street names in Ordinary Dance, and
Freddie'scostumes and that jazz, right there w/him. ok.71
Jill Johnston's prophecy in her view of the concert in the

Village Voice was the most extreme.
This was an importantprogramin bringingtogethera numberof young

talents who stand apartfrom the past and who could make the present
of moderndancemore exciting than it's been for twenty years (except
for an individualhere and there who alwaysmakesit regardlessof the
generalinertia). Almost all these dancersand choreographerswere in
Robert Dunn'scompositionclass at the LivingTheatre.72
The dancers, too, were delighted with the results of the

Judson concert. Rainer wrote of that evening:
We were all widly enthusiasticafterwards,and with good reason.

Aside from the enthusiasmof the audience[of about 300], the church
seemed a positive alternativeto the once-a-yearhire-a-hallmode of
operatingthat had plaguedthe strugglingmoderndancerbefore. Here
we could present things more frequently, more informally, and more
cheaply, and-most importantof all-more cooperatively.73
The first Judson concert had incorporated choreographic

techniques and human values that reflected and commented on both
the smaller dance and art worlds and the larger social world the
dancers inhabited. Through chance, collage, free association, co-
operative choice-making, slow meditation, repetition, lists, handling

objects,playinggames,and solvingtasks,the dancersand the dances

describeda world: an innocent Americandreampocked with
intimationsof anxiety; a world of physicality,bold action, free
choice, plurality,democracy,spontaneity,imagination,love, and
adventure. It was a world where traditionsexisted to be freely
sampledor boldly ridiculed,but also a world where that very
freedomwas interwovenwith the experienceof a shattered,frag-
menteduniverse.
Notes
1. JamesWaring,John HerbertMcDowell,Judith Dunn, Arlene

Croce,and Don McDonagh,"Judson: A Discussion,"Ballet
Review, 1, No. 6 (1967), 32; interviewwith StevePaxton,Ben-
nington,Vermont,April 11, 1980. This accountof "A Concert
of Dance"givenby the grouplaterknownas the JudsonDance
Theatreis adaptedfrom my dissertation"Democracy'sBody:
Judson Dance Theatre, 1962-1964," New York University,
1980. RobertDunn'schoreographyclassis discussedin
Chapter1.
2. Yvonne Rainer,Work,1961-73 (Halifax: Pressof the Nova
Scotia Collegeof Artsand Design;New York: New YorkUniv-
ersity Press, 1974), pp. 8-9; interviewwith Paxton, April 11,
1980. Paxtonremembersthat he, Rainer,Emerson,and Robert
Dunn went to the audition;Rainermentions only Paxton,
Emerson,andherself;Emersonremembersthat she, Rainer,and
Paxtonwent (Sally Banesand AmandaDegener,interviewwith
Ruth Emerson,New York,June 10, 1980, BenningtonCollege
JudsonProject[BCJP]); and ElaineSummersthinksthat it was
Rainer,Paxton, and both Robert and Judith Dunn who went
(interviewwith Elaine Summers,New York, March15, 1980).
Asked about this, Rainerrecalled(in a note to me dated July
29, 1980) that Judith Dunn was there and Robert Dunn was
not. Paxton doesn't rememberwhat piece he performedat the
audition.
3. Interviewwith Emerson,June 10, 1980.

208 DANCE CHRONICLE
4. New York Community Trust, plaque on the front of Judson

Memorial Church, 1966; Stanley Kauffmann, "Music by Al
Carmines,"New York Times, July 3, 1966, Sec. 2, p. 1; "Judson
Jubilee: Restoring a Well-Used Place," flyer in the Judson
Archives, December 1966.
5. Judson Archives.
6. Kauffmann, "Music by Al Carmines"; Jack Anderson, "The
Other Theatre at Judson," Ballet Review, 1, No. 6 (1967), 74;
Wendy Perron, interview with Al Carmines,New York, July 1,
1980.
7. Judson Poets' Theatre Program, November 18, 1961, Judson
Archives. (A play by WilliamPackard,In the First Place, had
already been performed in the choir loft of the church on March
23-26, 1961, by a group called the Judson Gallery Players,
directed by Robert Nichols.) H. Sohm, Happening & Fluxus
(Cologne: Kolnischer Kunstverein, 1970), unpaged.
8. Interview with Carmines, July 1, 1980.
9. Ibid. In fact, the first concert did take place upstairs in the
church sanctuary.
10. Rainer, Work, p. 8; interviews with Paxton; Washington, D.C.,
June 30, 1975, and New York, April 11, 1980.
11. Interview with Summers.
12. "A Concert of Dance" press release, June 1962; "Dance at
Judson," Village Voice, June 28, 1962, p. 17; interview with
Summers. Maclane should be spelled MacLane.
13. "A Concert of Dance" program, Judson Memorial Church,
July 6, 1962. Freeman should be spelled Friedman.
14. This description of the space comes from photographs of slightly
later concerts, numerous verbal descriptions of this first con-
cert, and my own later viewing of the space; also interview with
Carmines.
15. "A Concert of Dance" program, July 6, 1962.
16. Waring,McDowell et al., "Judson: A Discussion," p. 37; Michael
Rowe and Amanda Degener, interview with John Herbert
McDowell, New York, February 19, 1980 (BCJP).
17. Interview with Elaine Summers, New York, April 26, 1980.
18. Interview with McDowell, February 19, 1980.

19. Allen Hughes, "Dance Program Seen at Church," New York

Times, July 7, 1962, p. 9.
20. Ruth Emerson, score for Narrative.
21. Interview with Ruth Emerson, New York, June 11, 1980.
22. Ruth Emerson, score for Timepiece; interview with Emerson,
June 10, 1980.
23. Interview with Paxton, April 11, 1980.
24. Ibid.
25. Jill Johnston, "Democracy," Village Voice, August 23, 1962,
p. 9; Jill Johnston, "The New American Modem Dance," in
Richard Kostelanetz, ed., The New American Arts (New York:
Collier, 1967), p. 191.
26. Hughes, "Dance ProgramSeen at Church."
27. Interview with Remy Charlip, Bennington, Vermont, July 8,
1980.
28. Andy Warhol and Pat Hackett, POPism: The Warhol '60s
(New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1980), pp. 55-6.
30. Interview with Allen Hughes, New York, April 8, 1980.
31. Interview with Carmines.
32. Steve Paxton with Liza Bear, "Like the Famous Tree ... ,"
Avalanche, 11 (summer, 1975), 26; interview with Paxton,
April 11, 1980.
34. Interviews with John Herbert McDowell, New York, February
19 and May 17, 1980.
35. Johnston, "Democracy."
36. Diane di Prima, "A Concert of Dance-Judson Memorial
Church, Friday, July 6, 1962," Floating Bear, 21 (August
1962), 11; reprinted in The Floating Bear: A Newsletter,
Numbers 1-37, 1961-1969, ed. Diane di Prima and LeRoi
Jones, Introduction and Notes adapted from interview with
Diane di Prima (La Jolla, Calif.: Laurence McGilvery, 1973),
p. 239. (Hereafter, references to The Floating Bear are to the
reprint edition.) Interview with McDowell, May 17, 1980.
37. Elaine Summers, score for Ruth Emerson's Instant Chance.
Instant Chance was reconstructed by Elaine Summers on

210 DANCE CHRONICLE
June 29, 1980, at the Judson Memorial Church. It was video-

taped in black and white by Tony Carruthersand Joan Blair
for the Bennington College Judson Project, and in color by
Davidson Gigliotti.
38. Interview with Summers, March 15, 1980.
39. Hughes, "Dance Concert Seen at Church." Hughes says there
were six performers in Instant Chance, but the program lists
seven. Perhapsone of the performers did not finally dance in it.
40. David Gordon, "It's About Time," Drama Review, 19 (March
1975), 44; Christina Svane, interview with David Gordon,
New York, February 28, 1980 (BCJP); David Gordon, personal
communication, April 2, 1982.
41. Interview with Deborah Hay, New York, August 2, 1980
(BCJP); interview with Yvonne Rainer, New York, July 20,
1980.
42. Interview with Gretchen MacLane, New York, June 19, 1980.
43. Interview with Paxton, April 11, 1980; interview with MacLane.
44. Rainer, Work, p. 287; program, July 6, 1962; interview with
Trisha Brown, Alex Hay, and Robert Rauschenberg,New York,
February 17, 1980 (BCJP).
45. Rainer, Work,pp. 287-8.
46. Jill Johnston, "Boiler Room," Village Voice, March 29, 1962,
p. 14; Maxine Munt, "For Dancers Only... ," Show Business,
April 7, 1962, p. 6.
47. Interview with WilliamDavis, New York, March 3, 1980.
48. Interview with Yvonne Rainer, New York, July 4, 1980.
49. Program, July 6, 1962; Elaine Summers, score for Ruth
Emerson's part in The Daily Wake.
50. Interview with Elaine Summers, New York, April 5, 1980.
51. David Gordon, "It's About Time," Drama Review, 19 (March
1975), 44.
52. Interview with Gordon. I saw Mannequin Dance as part of
Gordon's The Matter plus and minus in December 1979.
53. Gordon, "It's About Time," p. 44.
54. Di Prima, "A Concert of Dance"; Johnston, "Democracy."
55. See, for instance, the essays in The Modern Dance, ed. Virginia
Stewart and Merle Armitage, 1935; rpt. New York: Dance
Horizons, 1970).

56. Di Prima, "A Concert of Dance."

57. Interview with Paxton, April 11, 1980; di Prima and Jones,
The Floating Bear, p. xii; interview with Charlip, July 8, 1980.
58. Sally Banes, Terpsichore in Sneakers: Post-Modern Dance
(Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1980), p. 59; Paxton with Bear,
"Like the Famous Tree," p. 26; interview with Paxton, April
11, 1980.
59. Interviews with Paxton, June 30, 1975, and April 11, 1980;
Paxton with Bear, "Like the Famous Tree," p. 29.
60. Interview with Paxton, June 30, 1975.
62. Interview with Emerson, June 10, 1980; program, July 6,
1962.
63. Carol Scothorn, letter to Sally Banes, April 12, 1982.
64. Ruth Emerson, score for Shoulder r.
65. William Davis, unpublished notes, March 24, 1980; interview
with Rainer, July 20, 1980; interview with Davis, March 3,
1980.
66. Walter Sorell, "Phyllis Lamhut, Albert Reid, William Davis,
and Yvonne Rainer," Dance Observer 30 (March 1963), 41.
68. Interview with Yvonne Rainer, New York, June 24, 1980;
Rainer, Work, pp. 288-9; di Prima, "A Concert of Dance."
The first photograph described here was taken at KQED-TV
in San Francisco in August 1962 and was published in Yvonne
Rainer with Liza Bear and Willoughby Sharp, "Yvonne Rainer:
The Performer as Persona," Avalanche 5 (summer 1972), 46;
the second photograph, also taken at KQED-TV, was published
in Rainer, Work,p. 289. In my interview with Rainer, June 24,
1980, she described and demonstrated these movements. The
text for OrdinaryDance is published in Rainer, Work, pp.
288-9.
69. Interview with Brown, Alex Hay, and Rauschenberg, February
13, 1980; interview with Alex Hay, New York, March 23, 1980;
interview with Paxton, April 11, 1975.
70. Hughes, "Dance Program Seen at Church"; interview with
Hughes.

212 DANCECHRONICLE
71. Di Prima,"A Concertof Dance."

72. Johnston,"Democracy."
73. Rainer,Work,p. 8.


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The Birth of the Judson Dance Theatre: "A Concert of Dance" at Judson Church, July 6, 1962

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? 1982 by Sally Banes

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process and the use of methods that metaphoricallystood for

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JudsonMemorialChurch,an architecturallyeclectic building

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from Union TheologicalSeminary,to coordinatethe arts program

Carminesremembersthat when the dancersapproachedhim

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have to give their first three concertsin the gymnasium,and the

Steve Paxton and Fred Herkoformed the publicity com-

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choreographersand performerstogether as participants,without

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"A Concertof Dance"was arrangedwith a slightly asym-

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The authors of Overtureare listed as W. C. Fields, Eugene Freeman

He would say, "Takea three-minutereel of film and do a complete

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1. OVERTURE:W. C. Fields, Eugene Freeman, John Herbert

2. Ruth Emerson: NARRATIVE

8. INTERMISSION: (coffee will be served in the lounge)

The originalprogramfor "A Concertof Dance,"courtesyof

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9. Elaine Sumers; THE DAILY WAKE

Fred Herk9-Cecil Taylor; LIKE MOSTPEOPLE--for Soren

13. William Davis: CRAYON

14. Yvonne Rainer: ORDINARYDANCE

15. Alex Hay, Deborah Hay, Charles Rotmil: RAFLADAN

Lighting design: Carol Scothorn; operator: Alex Hay

(Thanks are due to the public spirit of Judson

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Accordingto McDowell,some of the segmentswere upside-down

Item numbertwo consistedof two dancesby Ruth Emerson.

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Dramaticin the sense that by placingpeople in the space and by

The firstlive danceon the program,then, wasa new twist

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Timepiece,with its componentstightly governedby various

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Fred Herkocame out dressedin multicoloredbath or beach robe with

Remy Charlipremembersthat he made a cap based on an

He could do so many things well, but he couldn't supporthimself on

Paxtonwasnot impressedby Herko'sworkin generalduring

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It seemed very campy and self-conscious, which wasn't at all my

Allen Hugheswas more enthusiasticabout Herko'sstyle, as both

His dances were architecturally organized. He didn't just go willy-

Al Carmines,who workedmore closely with Herkoin the Judson

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John Herbert McDowell is a composer. He has no dance training....

Dianedi Primadescribedthe danceas "JohnMcDowellin a red sock,

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other people's music to accompany his own dances. Perhaps

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expresseddependedon both the rollingof the "dice"and the im-

Six performers appeared to be playing on a beach. They had various

Accordingto DavidGordon,whoseHIelen'sDance wasitem